Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Self Directed Blogging

I have resigned myself to the fact that of the two blogs I maintain, the one for my dog is immensely more popular. There are many reasons for this I suppose, including the fact that the dog blog topic is just more accessible to people as compared to the less frequent posts I make here on whatever comes to mind.

That is okay, because I have realized that I'm not blogging for others, but for my own benefit. I guess I have still been thinking of the Spark interview that Derek gave a while back concerning digital executors. While I may not feel I need an executor yet, just knowing that I have a few year's worth of photos and thoughts has a similar value to me as I suppose a diary would have for someone in the previous generation. I mean, do people still keep diaries in the traditional sense? While I don't keep a physical book I am making dated entries on a web page which amounts to basically the same thing.

While Derek had posthumous concerns, mine are more immediate: I don't have a really sharp memory. I admit that this is more due to laziness than any pre-disposition to mental failing, but the fact remains that I don't recall a lot that has happened in my life, so having a record like this is something I place value in having. Just knowing it is there and that I can look it up is reassuring. As an example, when I discovered that Blogger uses Picasaweb to handle the photos uploaded here, and that I could see all the photos in one easy spot, I was ecstatic. I spent an hour or two right then just looking at the various photos I uploaded, enjoying the memories that came with each one. Suddenly the power of flickr faded as the photos there were often not related to the 'diary' of the blog posts. They still have their place but I think that because they were always searchable and available, the novelty wasn't there.

Anyway, if you find yourself in the habit of reading my blog, congratulations. You're sneaking a peek into my diary and I hope you enjoy it. I certainly don't mind you reading (I'd have made it private if I did) but I've realized that the focus behind the writing is more directed at recording my thoughts and collecting my photos in an online scrapbook.

1 comment:

I realized that I was blogging for myself also. I like to be able to have one place to send friends and relatives to for information and it gives me a place to "rant" about my professional frustrtions.